Page 42 - Lighting Magazine March 2019

Building Bonds
Idlewood complements its lighting assortment with casual furniture and accessories that can make interior designers’ shopping easier.
“We have a great team of loyal sta who are the pulse of our showroom.”
—Rachel Lansing, Idlewood
company’s Director of Marketing & Public Rela- tions, also understands the importance of strong relationships with designers as well as the role of trusted advisors to trade professionals.
“We have a great team of loyal sta who are the pulse of our showroom,” Lansing states. “We highly value our design community and strategi- cally like to nd ways to cater to them. Speci cally, we want to be an enhancement to any project they’re working on. Because of that, our designer relationships are very long-term. Designers know when they come to Idlewood, they’ll be assisted by a showroom team they can trust and consider their partner. Most of our designer clients have been with us for over a decade.”
Reliable expeRts
Metro Lighting has six showrooms throughout the St. Louis area while Idlewood has three in Greater Chicagoland. Their spacious showrooms each fea- ture work areas for designers and their clients to spread out plans and meet with the showroom sta to get the technical lighting assistance they need.
“Designers’ time is valuable, and we take pride in the service we provide them,” Dorton notes. “That’s the reason I took on this position – to take the weight o their shoulders so they can focus on design.”
The teams at both companies focus on the im- portance of being the ultimate resource to their designers both in technical expertise and having the right product on display for their markets.
“While designers o en have some preferred brands based on their comfort zone, we wouldn’t be doing our job right if we didn’t expand their horizons by educating them further about other options,” Lansing remarks. “At the same time, our showrooms a ract slightly di erent customer bases, so it’s important to be in tune with each lo- cal market and display the looks and quality that will appeal to them. We take cues from designers on the styles, lines, and nishes they’d like to see in the showrooms.
“Today’s designers are willing to take more risks — and so are homeowners,” Lansing com- ments. “Over the past couple of years, we really
38 enLIGHTenment Magazine | March 2019
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